The Mental Gym – Redefining Mental Health as Everyday Training
- Brainz Magazine
- Sep 24, 2025
- 4 min read
Updated: Oct 1, 2025
Sogol Johnson is an award-winning experience designer who left her Fortune 500 career on a mission to break generational cycles of trauma for the next generation. Founder of the Cycle Breakers Lab, Author of Wiggles McGee – The Magic Within, is an educator and somatic practitioner empowering individuals to reset and rewire their nervous system in order to thrive instead of survive.
For too many people, seeking mental health support feels overwhelming. Long waitlists, high costs, and lingering stigma leave countless individuals struggling alone. Meanwhile, fitness culture has normalized the idea that you go to the gym to build strength, endurance, and resilience for your body as a lifestyle. But what about your mind and nervous system? We know healing takes time, so why do we expect to be “fixed” after just a few months or years of therapy? Do we work out our bodies for a few years and then declare we’re done, having reached our peak? Of course not. Fitness is a lifelong practice. An hour a day, 10,000 steps a day, always in progress. It’s time we treat mental fitness the same way and make 'brain day' as normal as 'leg day'.
I'm here to change the conversation, mental health shouldn’t be harder to access than physical health. It should be just as simple, repeatable, and empowering as adding a workout to your weekly routine. It's a lifestyle. One that the Mental Gym can successfully offer.
Why support is so hard to find
The truth is, most people who want support never make it past the first step. With so many different modalities from therapy to coaching to meditation apps, it’s hard to know where to begin. Traditional approaches can also feel abstract, lots of talking, but not always practical tools for the moment you’re panicking, shutting down, or spiraling. And sometimes, especially with trauma, you can't talk your way out of it. Talk therapy alone is often not enough, we need a whole-body approach. Too often, mental healing is framed as something extra, a daunting add-on that feels overwhelming rather than integrated into daily life. A clear sign that healing needs to be woven into daily life is the way people increasingly turn to social media for support. Therapists, coaches, and breathwork practitioners have gained large followings because the demand for accessible mental health support and daily self-care practices is so strong.
As a behavioral analyst and former UX researcher, I aim not here to simply add another voice to social media, but to dig deeper into what this demand means and provide a meaningful remedy. So I rolled my sleeves up.
The body knows first: The somatic advantage
One of the core philosophies behind The Mental Gym is that the body often knows before the mind does. Stress, anxiety, and burnout show up as tight shoulders, shallow breathing, racing thoughts, or the inability to focus. You can’t always “think” your way out of those states, but you can train your nervous system the same way you train your muscles.
Our somatic approach is rooted in polyvagal theory, trauma-informed coaching, and the pioneering work of Dr. Peter Levine. One of the central principles we practice is pendulation, the gentle rhythm of moving between states of activation and calm. This process allows the nervous system to safely release trapped emotions and discharge stuck energy. Over time, somatic therapy not only helps release what has been stored in the body, but most importantly, it re-educates the nervous system, teaching it new responses to old triggers and reshaping how fight, flight, or freeze is experienced. We teach body-based exercises, which we call nervous system reps, that help you shift from fight, flight, or freeze into steadiness, calm, and connection. What makes The Mental Gym unique is that it blends somatic exercises with practices like meditation, tapping, and goal setting, while also connecting members directly with trauma‑informed coaches and practitioners. This integration means you’re not left guessing which modality to choose, it’s all brought together in one place, with a personalized protocol based on your assessment.
What the mental gym offers
As Head Coach, I designed The Mental Gym to be accessible, repeatable, and personalized so you don’t just “learn” about resilience, you practice it. Membership includes:
Two live coaching sessions per month: Guided by me, your spotter and coach, to keep you accountable and supported.
A personalized healing roadmap: Tailored to your nervous system patterns, life demands, and goals.
Over 50 nervous system tools: Somatic exercises and regulation practices you can use in real time when stress hits.
Sound therapy, guided breathwork, and meditation: Designed to attune your healing frequency. Guided breathwork in particular supports deeper oxygenation, calms the vagus nerve, and helps release stored tension while building resilience. These practices help recalibrate the nervous system over time, creating rhythm and balance.
Tapping and goal setting: Helps reframe limiting beliefs and create consistent progress with measurable milestones.
Add-ons include craniosacral therapy, TRE (Tension & Trauma Release Exercises), Neuro‑Affective Touch, and opportunities for additional live coaching sessions.
A closing note
At the heart of The Mental Gym is a simple belief. Healing is not a destination, it’s a practice. Much like moving our bodies day after day, we can also commit to showing up for our inner world with consistency and compassion. The work is not about perfection or quick fixes, it’s about steady progress, stronger foundations, and a deeper connection to ourselves. My hope is that every person who walks into The Mental Gym feels supported, seen, and reminded that they don’t have to do this work alone. Together, we can create a new culture of mental fitness one rep, one breath, one day at a time. "If this vision resonates with you, I invite you to take the next step. Join The Mental Gym today and begin your own practice of lifelong mental fitness."
Sogol Johnson, MA, ACC, Author and Founder of the Mental Gym Program
Sogol Johnson, an award-winning designer with a master’s in Human-Centered Design, left her Fortune 500 career as a strategist to focus on breaking the cycle of generational trauma. Now an educator, writer, and advocate for healing childhood trauma, she combines her expertise in Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), Somatic Therapy, and trauma-informed coaching to empower parents and communities through self-parenting and healing practices.
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